Primary Menu

Brazil crisis: There may be bigger threats than Rousseff’s removal

The latest indicator of public opinion, released on Sunday by the respected Datafolha institute (in Portuguese), shows that 68% of Brazilians support the impeachment of President Rousseff. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the case against the under fire leader, that figure “feels” about right and Ms Rousseff is on the ropes, in the political equivalent of a bare-knuckle fight for her survival.

Where did it all go wrong?

A decade ago Brazil was the darling of the developing world. A nation whose economy was booming, not just because it was selling raw materials and commodities to China but because it was building its own high-tech industries, training its own engineers and becoming a genuine global “player”. Upwardly mobile Brazil soon shoved the UK aside to become the world’s sixth largest economy.